Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney announced Friday that has stopped allowing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to access a key city law enforcement database.
From True Pundit:
Kenney plans to formally announce the decision to terminate the city’s contract with ICE Friday afternoon, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.
“I cannot in good conscience allow the agreement to continue,” Kenney told the paper.
Kenney’s decision comes after several incidents that he says gave him reason to be concerned that the agency was using its access to the Preliminary Arraignment Reporting System, or PARS, in “inappropriate ways.”
The mayor’s office claimed that ICE would search the database to find Philadelphia residents born outside of the U.S. and target them for investigation, even if they had not been accused or convicted of a crime.
This could be a horrible headway into a downward spiral. If other major cities follow suit, or states as a whole, then ICE will have less and less access to databases that can be used to keep us all safe.
